


Songs of Joy and Peace

by swallowthecap



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Christmas, Established Relationship, F/F, accidental angst, still mostly soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-14 03:05:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17500376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swallowthecap/pseuds/swallowthecap
Summary: The Doctor and Yaz sneak away from the Khan family party to seek out the Christmas lights.





	Songs of Joy and Peace

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, look. It’s the Christmas writing I began in early December and couldn’t finish until mid-January. I hope you’re not all sick of festivities and can still give this one some time. It started out soft as hell and then got angsty as fuck by the end. Apologies if that isn’t your thing. Points for those who spot references to grumpy yet beloved Nine. 
> 
> Also, Yaz totally skips out on “baby” and “darling” to call Thirteen “gorgeous” affectionately instead. These are the facts and I just provide them.
> 
> Thank you, as always.

The party had become something of a Khan family tradition. While their Christmas Day was often spent in front of the television and free from any religious sentiment, the door to their tiny flat would open during the second week of December to usher in family, friends, and colleagues for a night of cheesy party games and Hakim Khan’s soggy pakora. She would never admit it, but Yaz treasured the get-together more than any other holiday. It was a thrill to see Sonya plastered with sloppy cheek kisses from aunties and older neighbours while her father blared their ancient _Now That’s What I Call Christmas!_ CD on repeat until it skipped in the middle of the _Band Aid_ _1984_ single. 

When she asked her parents if there was room for one more, Yaz didn’t quite know what to expect. She could see the Doctor standing in the corner of the room with a grin stuck on her ageless face, talking animatedly with two of her father’s friends. Both men stared back at her, wide eyed and nodding furiously. There was a paper cup of mulled wine in the Time Lord’s hand, and she was starting to pick at its rim in a nervous fidget between sentences. 

“Yasmin, are you listening to a word I’m saying?”

Her mother frowned at her, lips pursed in annoyance. There was an older, plump man hovering at her shoulder, wearing a perplexed expression and a tie with a repeating pattern of tiny snowmen. Yaz tried her best to pluck his name out from the back of her mind but nothing clicked. Her mother had mentioned working with a Trevor at an old temp agency once, but perhaps he was that Clive bloke from the Park Hill Residents’ Association. Her eyes flicked over to the Doctor again, too distracted to play a game of _Guess Who?_.

“Of course,” she lied through her teeth, flashing a polite smile to the mystery man for good measure. 

“Clive wants to make a formal complaint at the station about the dog fouling out the front,” her mother continued. “I said you would look into it for him.”

It took the best of her inner strength to restrain herself from rolling her eyes. She only hoped that her mother could feel her irritation radiating from her body in great pulses. 

“Um, right,” Yaz replied, slightly mystified. She turned to Clive. “Just give us a call in the New Year and someone will reply to you in writing within two-“

Najia was quick to interject, reaching out to grasp her daughter’s wrist lightly. “Oh, but surely you could bump his enquiry up the queue a bit? More like a neighbourly favour.” 

“That’s not really how it works,” Yaz said bitterly from the corner of her mouth, throwing a pleading look towards her mother. 

Movement in the corner of her eye distracted her then. She angled her head away from the conversation slightly to catch sight of the Doctor. The Time Lord was weaving her way through the cramped living room, squeezing past little groups mingling around the coffee table and hopping over Sonya’s outstretched legs as she sat slumped on the sofa. She was heading for the hallway.

“Sorry, but I’m just going to nip to the loo,” Yaz announced, tone apologetic. “Two minutes.”

She breezed off, politely dodging gestures and inviting looks from friends and cousins as she followed the Doctor’s path out of the doorway. Her mother still rambled on to Clive, voice louder than every other in the room. The atmosphere inside their cosy flat suddenly felt suffocating.

In the darkness of the hallway, the Doctor lingered outside the bathroom. The light shining underneath the door cast a sliver of a yellow streak across the carpet. Her head whipped up at the sound of Yaz’s soft footsteps approaching.

“Hiya,” she whispered.

Yaz fumbled through the dim to find her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze and intertwining their fingers. She heard the Doctor let out a heavy breath beside her. 

“You alright, gorgeous?” Yaz asked. “Wanted to come over and rescue you but I was lumped with arsey Clive from the Residents’ Association.”

“He did look a bit arsey, didn’t he?” the Doctor murmured. “Like his tie though. Very festive.”

“Of course you do.”

Laughter and the smooth voice of George Michael echoed from the living room as _Last Christmas_ was cranked up on the stereo. Yaz could feel the Doctor’s thumb rubbing along the back of her hand in soothing swipes, her grip tight. 

“Do you feel a bit overwhelmed?” the Doctor wondered aloud, almost as if she were asking herself. 

“A little,” Yaz admitted. “What about you?”

The Doctor let out a soft chuckle, knocking her shoulder against Yaz’s own. “Life of the party, me,” she said. “I think I were rambling on again though.”

“You were dead cute earlier when you were playing snap with Sonya and the cousins.”

“Was I?!”

Their hands dropped as Yaz reached up to loop the Doctor’s trouser braces through her fingers, guiding her back against the wall with a gentle push. She gave a smirk as the Time Lord met her eyes. Wetting her bottom lip just barely with the tip of her tongue, Yaz kept her face millimetres away from the Doctor’s own. She left a beat of anticipation before pressing a light kiss to the other woman’s mouth.

“I thought you-“

They met in another kiss. The Doctor sighed deeply against Yaz, bringing her hands to her waist.

“-were very-“

The third kiss felt urgent. Yaz could sense a flutter of desire blooming down in her stomach. Her thigh instinctively slipped between the Doctor’s legs.

“-very cute...”

The door to the bathroom sprung open, flooding the hallway with warm light. The pair parted quickly, Yaz spinning until she too was pressed up against the pale wallpaper. One of her aunties stood in the doorway, faintly startled at the unexpected company. The Doctor wiped at her mouth with her hand like a child. Yaz could see her smirking mischievously in her peripheral vision.

“Oh, it’s you, Yasmin!” her auntie declared, clasping a hand to her chest with an uncertain smile. “Didn’t realise there was a queue waiting!”

A nervous giggle jumped up Yaz’s throat. 

“Don’t mind us,” the Doctor said. “Too much mulled wine and mocktails - we’re bursting!”

Yaz watched as her auntie pulled her face into a brief grimace, nodding despite. With a small wave of her hand, she brushed past them both and headed back down the hallway to rejoin the crowd in the living room. The Doctor let out a low whistle once she was safely out of sight.

“That were close,” she muttered. “If that was your mum in there, she would have battered me senseless.”

“Yeah, and the rest of it!” 

They shared a look and suddenly found themselves laughing together; little titters morphing into belly shaking heaves that left them breathless, leaning on each other as the muscles in their stomachs tensed and contracted in fits. Yaz swore she was in love in that moment, gazing at the Doctor as her shoulders shook and eyes filled with joyful tears. Her head spun with the adoration that consumed her, so powerful that she thought she might burst with it. Then the Doctor beamed at her and she was gone, heart captured all over again. 

“Want to get out of here?” Yaz asked, finally regaining her composure. 

The Doctor looked suddenly surprised. “Won’t your parents mind if we left?”

“They won’t even notice once they whip out the Trivial Pursuit.”

“Where do you want to go then?”

“I think I know somewhere.”

**XXX**

They bolted out of the front door of the flat and across the covered walkway, Yaz hauling the Doctor along by the hood of her coat while tucking her own scarf into her leather jacket. Frantically pressing the call button to bring the lift up from the ground floor, they bundled through its doors as soon as it arrived. After a few moments of waiting, they were yet to make a move. The Doctor began to rummage in her bum bag for her sonic, muttering. With a smooth flourish, she aimed its golden end at the control panel and fried its circuits, sending them plummeting downwards before hitting the concrete below with a bang. “My hero,” Yaz cooed at her as they both regained their balance. 

A patchwork of lit windows silhouetted by Christmas trees and decorations shone out through the darkness from Park Hill as they ran down the surrounding residential streets, feet slipping on the pavements slick after rain. Yaz squeezed her hand securely into the Doctor’s own, bitter wind nipping at her ears as they made their great escape. Only the slap of their shoes on the wet ground and heavy breaths from their lungs echoed around them.

“Doctor?” Yaz asked, panting slightly as she kept pace. “Why are we running?”

They came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the road. Yaz gripped onto the Doctor’s forearm with both hands, the soles of her trainers sliding out from under her and threatening to send her flying. The Time Lord wrapped a protective arm around her waist to keep her upright. 

“Sorry,” the Doctor murmured, face scrunched into a goofy smile. “Do you ever get an adrenaline rush and just go with it?”

Yaz let herself double over slightly, hands on her thighs as she inhaled deeply. Though she had once spent murky mornings running down the same streets in preparation for the Hallamshire Police physical fitness test, her ability to cover a mile in just over ten minutes had dwindled slightly since. 

“You’re mad, you,” Yaz laughed out between huffs. “Haven’t even told you where we’re going yet.”

The Doctor gazed down at her with a perplexed expression, the silver and gold cuff on her ear glinting under the orange glow of the street lamps. She looked serene, as if she had barely come out in a sweat.

“Oh, did I forget to mention that I share telepathic qualities with the TARDIS?” she said, almost casually. 

Despite searching for the words to verbalise the immediate horror that coursed its way through her, Yaz could only manage to babble sounds. Flashes of her most private thoughts came to her in fragments; from her continuing obsession with the Doctor’s unique vocal ticks and facial quirks to the extensive mental list of her deepest sexual fantasies, all involving the Time Lord and some featuring details so sordid that they forced her to shiver and squirm involuntarily.

“I-I don’t...” Yaz stammered. “I mean... What have you- Did you-“

The Doctor’s face twisted in mischief and a little cackle slipped from her lips. 

“Only messing,” she admitted gleefully. “Well, kind of...”

Yaz straightened up in silence, fixing the other woman with a hard stare. She watched as the Doctor blinked at her once and then twice, all remnants of cheekiness sliding away from her features within seconds. 

“Oh, you better start running now,” Yaz warned the Doctor, voice flat. 

“I were only joking!” 

“I’ll give you until the count of three...”

“Yaz-“

“One...”

The Doctor quirked an eyebrow but Yaz kept strong. She took a step towards her girlfriend, arms outstretched with palms facing the black sky above. 

“Come on now, love-“ 

“ _Two_...”

With a sharp turn on her heel, the Doctor took off from the spot in which Yaz stared her down. Coat flapping behind her, she appeared to glide across the tarmac as she made a break for it. It took Yaz a moment to register her tactics, but soon the police officer had gathered her strength and bolted behind her in pursuit. She could hear childlike laughter carrying on the wind as the Doctor glanced back at her, nose scrunched and tongue peeking out from between the corner of her lips.

“You’re not getting away that easily!” Yaz called out to her.

She had almost caught up to the Time Lord, so close that her fingertips could brush against her if she stretched her arm out enough. In a moment of carefree abandon, where a sense of invincibility overpowered the logic she prided herself on, Yaz let herself be carried up into the air with a strained push of her feet on the hard ground below. She felt herself collide with the Doctor, wrapping her limbs around the other woman’s lithe body and clinging on to her back for dear life. Yaz gulped as she felt her stumble slightly under the new weight, but any sudden fears were driven away by the Doctor tugging her arms tighter around her neck. 

“Oi!” the Time Lord chastised sarcastically. “Do I look like a Blackpool donkey?”

“You don’t want me to answer that.”

Yaz pressed her face just behind the Doctor’s ear, letting her lips meet the skin to nibble at it playfully with her teeth. She allowed herself to become lost in the scent of her girlfriend for a moment, the freshness of peppermint and the subtle spice of mulled wine mingling with the ever present metallic tang that seemed to have embedded itself into her every pore. The Doctor giggled as the cold end of Yaz’s nose made contact, attempting to draw her shoulders up to her ears at the sensation. 

“Careful or I’ll tip you into a hedge,” the Doctor joked, hiking Yaz higher up onto her back with ease.

Yaz laughed. “I’ll just go and see the Christmas lights by myself then, shall I?”

“Christmas lights?!”

“Thought you might like to see them if we went into town.”

“Christmas lights with Yaz. Brilliant!”

“Jog on then,” Yaz encouraged, poking her knee into her girlfriend’s ribs in signal. “We’ve not got all night.”

“Don’t get too comfy back there now.”

The police officer settled herself into the grasp she had on the Doctor, crossing her arms over her rainbow-striped chest. “You owe me after that,” she mumbled, gentle smile hidden within the Doctor’s hair. 

**XXX**

“I think one of my earliest memories is standing in this spot, looking up at this tree.”

The pair loitered on the fringes of the busy Christmas markets, feet away from a towering spruce adorned with thousands of warm lights. The Doctor slung her arm around Yaz’s shoulders lazily, taking in their surroundings with her familiar curious expression. The bustle of pedestrians seemed to swim around them; families with children in pushchairs, elderly shoppers on their way to catch buses, and other young couples caught up in similar romantic embraces.

“It’s terrific,” the Doctor replied, eyes popped in wonder. “Proper ace, that is.’

“This is where you tell me about some far off dwarf planet where trees come to life or something,” Yaz snickered, her whole hand curled around the Doctor’s index finger as it dangled at her shoulder.

“Well, I’ve met a few sentient trees in my time but rarely any with such festive tastes in fashion.”

“Sorry, what?”

“Did fight off a robotic killer Christmas tree once or twice though - nasty ones them… God, how old were you in 2006? That Christmas was an absolute scream.”

“I were about seven years-old, I think.”

“Ah!” The Doctor laughed, seemingly at nothing. “Let me guess… you unwrapped a new convertible for your _Bratz_ dolls… and… a _Tamagotchi_?”

A look of incredulity passed over Yaz’s face. She dropped the Doctor’s hand, twisting to gawk at her. “Who’re you?” she asked, tone mocking. “Father Christmas or something?”

The Time Lord merely waggled her eyebrows. 

“Oh, do piss off!”

“Must admit that I earned a similar reaction the last time I whipped out that old trick,” the Doctor replied, smug. “Not quite in those words, mind you, but same sentiment.”

She reached out to pull Yaz’s hand back into her own and cocked her head in the direction of the markets behind them. The police officer followed her signal, turning her back on the glittering Christmas tree and letting herself be led off towards the faint sounds of instrumental carols and the almost sickly sweet smell permeating the air.

“Fancy a bit of fudge?” the Doctor asked. “I think I also spied doughnuts somewhere.” 

They sauntered through the pathways of the market, snaking around huts and stalls offering everything from hand knitted tree decorations and carved soaps, to bags of sugary pink candy floss and fat German-style sausages in white rolls. The Doctor stopped at a stall boasting two large chocolate fountains, requesting a long kebab stick with pieces of fruit, fudge, and marshmallows crammed onto its length and drizzled in warm milk chocolate. Yaz plumped for two large helpings of the fudge, wrapped neatly in brown paper to take back to her parents as compensation for skipping out on the rest of their party. When it came time to pay, the Doctor flashed a guilty smile at her girlfriend. Yaz dipped into her pockets for change, shaking her head in disapproval yet beaming. She was rewarded with a chocolatey kiss when no one else was looking.

“Why do you never talk about your past lives that much?” Yaz asked as they walked past children and parents queueing for the helter-skelter slide, its red and white striped exterior reaching up into the dark sky above. 

The Doctor didn’t offer an instant reply, choosing instead to quietly munch on a chocolate coated strawberry. “Not much to say, really,” she finally offered after a swallow. 

“That seems hard to believe,” Yaz retorted. “You’re full of stories yet none of them ever seem to have a proper ending. You mention people but I don’t know their names.”

“Their stories live in the past now, Yaz. It’s not like I could ever take you back to see it all play out.”

“I know that!” the other woman exclaimed, slightly exasperated. “I just find it proper mad that when I was unwrapping Christmas presents in 2006, you were out there defending us all, as usual, but with a totally different face. You’ve existed all my life in some timeless state while I’ve learned to walk and talk, and go to school and grow into a person. How can everything have led up to now?”

“But does that really all matter, in the grand scheme?” the Doctor asked firmly, licking a drip of chocolate from her lip. “Until I fell through the roof of that train, you had no idea that there was anything more to wish for from the universe.”

“I just want to understand what’s happened in your past. There were others - others like me, Graham, Ryan.” Yaz paused. “There were other girls. I know there were.”

“Does it bother you that there were?”

The Doctor’s expression was creased with concern. She stopped abruptly in the middle of their path, earning tuts and grumbles from a couple behind who narrowly avoided stepping on her heels. A subtle tingling began to work its way through Yaz, her heartbeat jumping. She met the worried eyes in front of her and let out a hefty sigh, bringing a careful hand up to brush a piece of the Time Lord’s golden hair behind her ear. 

“Honestly,” she admitted. “I’m actually not.”

A wave of relief seemed to rush over the Doctor, her body noticeably loosening. She caught hold of Yaz’s hand and pressed it into her cheek, holding it there. 

“You can love more than one person in a lifetime,” Yaz continued. “I never really understood it until Prem. Nani was robbed of him so quickly, yet she still found the strength to open her heart again and our whole family exists because of it. We’re like a symbol of her bravery in some weird way.”

“I do love you,” the Doctor assured. “I hope you know that.”

“I know, but I just wish you would trust more. I only try to poke and prod all this stuff out of you because I want to share the burden with you, even if some of it probably will bother me. Do you get what I’m saying?”

The Doctor nodded, letting a tiny giggle of amusement escape as Yaz’s hand moved along with the up-down of her head. 

“Come on,” Yaz chuckled back, removing her hand. “I’m trying to be serious here.”

“I’ll tell you about them if you want to know.” 

Instinctively, Yaz slipped her arm underneath the Doctor’s own and cuddled into her side. They set off to stride along again, the bustle of the markets oblivious to them. 

“There was Rose,” the Doctor began, the warmth of nostalgia running through her voice. “You would have loved her, Yaz. She was so beautiful.”

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
